CHAPTER 83

SPECIAL AGENT BOYD Bertolet watched Snake Knox and four other men in their seventies walk out of the main entrance of the Concordia Sheriff’s Department and pause at the top of the stairs.

“Looks like a geriatric walking club,” said his partner, Sheila Stowers.

Boyd saw at least three vehicles waiting to pick up the newly released Double Eagles. “Watch who gets in what car. Do you recognize Snake?”

“Oh, yeah,” Sheila said. “He’s the wiry old fucker. The crankiest-looking bastard in the bunch.”

“I don’t even get why the boss is letting them out. You know they killed Thornfield yesterday. Even if that meth disappeared, we could have held them—especially with Kaiser invoking the Patriot Act.”

“Kaiser knows what he’s doing,” Sheila said. “If he’s letting these guys walk, he’s got a damn good reason. But you and I won’t ever be told what it is. We’ll just have to pay attention down the line.”

Three Double Eagles walked down the steps, then climbed into the waiting cars and pickup trucks. Snake accompanied the last man, but Boyd didn’t see him get into any vehicle. Instead, Snake seemed to be walking along the front wall of the courthouse, away from the vehicles.

“Where’s he going?” Boyd asked.

“I don’t know,” Sheila said, a note of concern in her voice.

“Do you see anybody waiting to pick him up over that way?”

“Nope. Just parked cars.”

Bertolet grunted and watched Snake Knox walk toward the edge of the parking lot, which abutted the parking lot of a single-story shopping center on the east side of the courthouse.

“I’ll bet somebody’s waiting for him in a car over in that lot,” Sheila guessed. “Whoever it is didn’t want the courthouse cameras to record their face. Let’s see if we can get a look.”

She picked up her radio and called a second surveillance car, asked them to pull into the shopping center lot and be sure they saw Knox get into whatever vehicle was waiting for him.

“He moves pretty good for a seventy-year-old man,” Boyd commented.

“He still flies crop dusters, which means he’s a long way from dead. Let’s pull out to the main road. We’ll pick them up when they leave the lot.”

“Let’s give it a minute,” Boyd said, keeping his eyes on Snake’s diminishing figure.

“Uh-oh,” Sheila said.

“What?”

“Look.” She pointed toward the shopping center. Snake Knox had just climbed onto an orange-and-white motorcycle and kick-started it. Bertolet could see smoke blooming from the exhaust pipe.

“Tell me that’s not a dirt bike,” he said.

“It’s a dirt bike. Looks like a 250.”

“Fuck.”

Boyd jammed the Ford into gear and hit the accelerator, but even as he did he saw Snake pull onto the grass lawn beside the shopping center, then spin a shower of gravel into the air as he took off toward the tree line far behind the stores. His front wheel lifted off the ground from the force of his acceleration.

“Look at that shit!” Boyd cried.

“I told you,” Sheila said. “A goddamn crop duster. What do you expect?” She keyed her radio and said, “What are you waiting for? Get this car up onto the grass and try to stay with him.”

“There’s no way,” Boyd said. “He’ll be in those trees in thirty seconds, and without air support, he might as well be in Mexico. He’s gone.”

“I know.”

“We need a goddamn drone.”

“I wonder if we have an aircraft close,” Stowers said. “Kaiser might divert the chopper to keep eyes on Snake Knox.”

“Give it a try,” Boyd said, aiming the Ford at the space between the courthouse and the shopping center. “I sure wish this was a rental.”

SNAKE WAS THREE MILES from the courthouse when he stopped the Honda. He’d lost the FBI after the first half mile, as he’d known he would, so he’d taken care to ride the last two miles under heavy tree cover. He’d found the pistol and the cell phone he’d requested in a leather bag attached to the handlebars, and during the ride over, he’d called his illegitimate son and told him to be parked by a certain borrow pit fifteen minutes later. Unlike the pit where Deke Dunn had died, this one lay north of Highway 84, but otherwise the topography was the same.

Snake put the motorcycle back in gear, rode to the edge of the water, then stashed the bike behind some thick cottonwoods and waited. If Forrest meant to kill him, it was likely to happen here, now.

After two minutes, a navy blue pickup truck nosed up the little dirt road, stopped thirty feet from the water, and fell silent. Through the windshield Snake saw two familiar faces. One belonged to Alois Engel—his son—the other to Wilma Deen. He wondered how far he could trust them. Most bastard sons carried a heavy burden of anger, and Alois was no different. And while Wilma was no fan of Forrest’s, she didn’t like Snake much better, considering how he’d treated her over the years. He’d screwed her when she was young and attractive and ignored her all the decades since.

Snake listened hard for other engine sounds, but he heard none.

After another minute, he walked into the open with his pistol in his hand and beckoned them out of the truck. They moved naturally as they got out—no shared glances or any other signs of nerves—so Snake calmed down a little.

“Everything cool?” Alois asked.

“Worked like a charm,” Snake said, walking toward the truck. “The Fibbies don’t know what hit ’em.”

“What do we do now?”

Snake studied the boy before he answered. Alois looked nothing like him. Snake saw his mother in the blond hair and too-close-together eyes. “Dump the bike in the water,” he said, “and get the hell out of here. It’s over behind those trees.”

Alois nodded and went to take care of it. When he was out of earshot, Wilma said, “I don’t like your boy much. Thinks he knows everything.”

“Shows the apple don’t fall far from the tree.”

She laughed bitterly. “You got that right.” Wilma looked over her shoulder and watched Alois run the Honda into the black water. “Look, before he gets back,” she said, “I heard something you might want to know.”

“What’s that?”

“I got a friend who works part-time at the motel where them FBI agents are staying.”

“And?”

“She tells me her manager asked her to plant some bugs in their rooms yesterday.”

Snake went on alert. He’d heard nothing about this from Forrest. “Keep going. Who’s this manager?”

“Name’s Wade Kimball.”

Snake smiled. Kimball’s father had been a Klansman back in the day, and the son fancied himself a right-wing blogger. “Little Wade,” Snake said. “Forrest must have put him up to that. Where else would he get the bugs? Does your friend know who’s monitoring the transmissions?”

“Kimball himself, she thinks. He’s been locked up in his office ever since the bugs went in.”

Snake couldn’t believe his luck.

Alois walked back up to them and said, “What now?”

“Now?” Snake grinned. “Now we’re gonna kill some people.”

The boy’s mouth twitched a couple of times, then broke into a slit of a smile. After years of waiting, the hard-core action he’d been craving was at hand. Snake had figured Alois would be more than ready.

“Who?” Alois asked.

“Penn Cage and his old man. Maybe even that FBI agent, Kaiser.”

Wilma drew back her head, her eyes unbelieving. “That sounds pretty damn stupid to me.”

“You want to go sit home and watch your soap operas, go ahead.”

“I’m ready,” Alois said. “Where are they?”

“The mayor’s home right now and covered by about twenty cops. But later on, he won’t be. And neither will his father.”

“Where’ll they be?”

“I’d lay odds on Henry Sexton’s funeral.”

“How do you know that?” Wilma asked.